Artist Leonid Pasternak. Does not create a portrait of his era?

Age kept and treasured it. For the life of Russian artist Leonid Pasternak Osipovitch might end almost before it began, when the 3 April 1862, he was born on the outskirts of Odessa, at the inn of his father. Leonid (Isaac Leib) was the sixth child in a simple Jewish family. His mother (like many women in the Pale of Settlement) was illiterate.

... A newborn fading. The parents were in despair. Going through the entire Odessa yard. And then the old tailor-Jew saved the child. He took an earthen pot and smashed it on the floor. A miracle happened - baby pink and alive.

"Alexander Pushkin on the sea shore" There, in Odessa, on the sleepy courtyard, under the eternal cries, laughter and tears, a little Pasternak made his first charcoal drawings on the walls. His first fee, 15 cents, he has received from the porter, after painted several pictures of the hunt. Both - customer and author - have been very pleased.Paintings and portraits of childhood, unconsciously fixing all ... pictures and portraits, kanuvshie forever into oblivion.

His university LO Pasternak, "Self-Portrait" Parents did not approve of the decision of his son becoming an artist. Is it a profession? "Dyer" some! Is it provides the means to live with dignity and be a respected member of society?Therefore in 1881, Leonid entered Moscow University and two years prozanimalsya at the Medical Faculty. When it was the turn pathologist, he broke down and left medicine. However, further knowledge of the proportions of the human body and the head rendered him invaluable in painting.

Pasternak arrives in Novorossiysk (Odessa) University law school. In this university were allowed to study in parallel anywhere else. And he entered the Royal Munich art school, two years later, brilliantly, with a medal, finishes it.

"The night before the exam" Pasternak drew portraits of the era. Here, with a taste of bitterness, painting"Meeting of the faculty of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture" (1902), that is, that the Council have not adopted it in the Wall College in 1881-m. Here's the night before the exam. " Who are the students had not known such nights?Leonid not formally studied for diplomas and degrees, he studied all his life, he is endlessly searching for his own style, unique and unmistakable, he honed skills among volatile and incomprehensible faces phantasmagorical era in which he lived and worked.

Lessons Music 17-year-old Rosa KaufmanOni met at a youth party, in Odessa - he, a 23-year-old, blue-eyed, slender and handsome, yet unknown artist, and she was 18-year-old, dreamy, pale after a hard day, nearly fatal illness, is a renowned pianist. Leonid Pasternak, who arrived in 1885 in Odessa to get a law degree, and his future wife, Rosa Kaufman, a pupil of the great masters of Europe. She, a girl of fourteen, playing in St. Petersburg was very impressed with Anton Rubinstein. Love at first sight. But Pasternak was in despair. What could he offer, impoverished artist, she is already Professor of the Odessa Conservatory. He could only draw and believe in your lucky star. And the era to see about his portrait.

TretyakovThe volunteer Pasternak gives military duty Fatherland, having served a year in the artillery. Subtle spiritual communication with his beloved does not break. He plans to write a large canvas at the exhibition Wanderers - "News from the Motherland", inspired by his military service. And here it is - a miracle! Tretyakov himself buys a picture for my gallery!Inspired by the artist moved to Moscow and married his beloved pianist. It was the 1889 th year.Life was cold and tender. In Moscow, a quiet, away from the capital. In 1890, the first-born is born, the future great Russian poet - Boris Pasternak. But life was diabolically poor. Orders were arhimalo. And my wife and little son were forced to left in Odessa, to relatives, which could hit in the summer and Leonid Osipovich.

Avtoportet ProfessorHe actively participates in exhibitions Wanderers, takes part in "World of Art. In the 1894-m, have been nominated for the post of Professor of the Moscow School of Painting, he falls into a deep sadness. The fact that the trustee College, the Moscow mayor, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich was considered anti-Semite. Pasternak wrote a letter in which he stated that not refuse for the sake of the prestigious places on the faith of their fathers. Once again, a miracle. It is approved for the post! And a quarter of a century, Professor Pasternak is taught in school, where, ironically, have not accepted it once.

Mirror of the Russian world "Tolstoy" In 1900, the exhibition Wanderers, the work of the artist "debutante" noticed and appreciated the Count Tolstoy, Leo Nikolayevich. Then famous, cult, as they say nowadays, the writer, invited the author to himself, to Yasnaya Polyana. So Leonid Pasternak was a mirror of Tolstoy, his appearance, his inner world and the world his immortal works, the illustrations for books classics. Only in one of Tolstoy Museum stores now 200 works of his portrait painter and illustrator. Of these, 36 - portraits of the graph.The features of many great men, those great times of Russian art grabbed a brush or pencil Pasternak. Them all. So, from memory - the portraits of Gorky, Rubinstein, Gay, Gershenzon, Shestov, Rachmaninoff, Rilke ... In the pictures, he is infinitely deep reflects Russian world in all its matchless beauty - a modest nature, strict churches, the faces of people living in the shadow of things to come ruthless era.When it's Time of Troubles, and there were new owners of life - it reflects in the mirror of creation, all I could display. The artist has only one right is created, reflecting.

The Master and his farewell shelter1921. Germany, where he arrived for treatment. He creates. He already creates impressionistic. Have a sense of power over an insane era of realism Wanderers?Is not it madness era drove him from Germany in 1938 from the clutches of stormtroopers?He removes the picture that could, in a quiet Oxford, where bombs could not reach, friable London.